The present invention relates to a door attachment portion structure and a manufacturing method of a door attachment portion of a vehicle which comprises a hinge bracket for attaching a door hinge to a pillar member.
Conventionally, a hinge pillar and a front pillar which interconnect, in a vertical direction, a front end portion of a roof side rail extending in a longitudinal direction (a side end portion of a front header) and a front end portion of a side sill extending in the longitudinal direction are provided at a side portion of a vehicle body. The front pillar is provided to be continuous to an upper end of the hinge pillar. Since the hinge pillar forms a front-side portion of a periphery of an ingress/egress opening for passengers, a pair of upper-and-lower door hinges which support a front door so that the front door can open or close the ingress/egress opening for passengers are attached to a hinge pillar reinforcement via a hinge attachment portion.
In a case in which there exists an attaching error of the front door to the vehicle body, the continuity of a design face of the front door and a design face of a fender panel are damaged, thereby causing deterioration of the product marketability, such as product. In general, since the hinge attachment portion for attaching the door hinge is formed integrally with a pillar member (a pillar outer panel or a pillar reinforcement) provided on a vehicle-body side, an attaching error of the door hinge, i.e., the attaching error of the front door is restrained to a minimum.
A side vehicle-body structure of a vehicle disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2013-141928 comprises a hinge pillar including a pillar outer panel having a front wall face and a pillar inner panel which form a closed cross section extending vertically, a pillar reinforcement provided in the above-described closed cross section and including a slant face, and a guide means for guiding the front wheel rearward and outward in a vehicle collision. A hinge attachment portion which includes a flat-shaped hinge attachment wall portion on an outward side in the vehicle width direction is formed integrally at the pillar reinforcement, and a holding tool for attaching the door hinge to the pillar reinforcement is arranged inside the pillar reinforcement.
There is a need to provide the pillar member and the hinge attachment portion as separate parts (components) which are formed separately from each other for the purpose of improving the vehicle design or the design's flexibility or the like. However, in a case in which the hinge attachment portion is configured by the hinge bracket which is formed separately from the pillar member, a component tolerance of the hinge bracket may be accumulated at an attachment position of the hinge bracket, in addition to an existing component tolerance of the hinge bracket. Consequently, the attaching error of the door hinge increases, so that there is a concern that an attachment accuracy of the door hinge may deteriorate improperly.
Further, in a case in which the hinge bracket is joined to the pillar member by using a spot welding device, there is also a concern that a working (processing) error may occur at the hinge bracket because of pressing of the spot welding device. That is, since a welding portion of the hinge bracket which has been positioned through a pressing contact operation by electrodes of the spot welding device is pressed against a pillar-member side at the welding, a specified extensional deformation of a pressing direction occurs at the welding portion. Meanwhile, since the pressing contact operation by the electrodes is released when the welding is complete, a specified shrinking deformation of an anti-pressing direction occurs at the welding portion because of spring back. A difference between the extensional deformation of the pressing direction and the shrinking deformation of the anti-pressing direction causes the working (processing) error at the welding.
In a case in which the component tolerance and the working error caused by the welding (hereafter, referred to as “error and the like”) influence the attachment position of the hinge bracket in the longitudinal direction or in the vertical direction when the hinge bracket is attached to the pillar member, such error and the like can be eliminated (solved) by using an adjusting mechanism in which a bolt-hole size of the door hinge is set to be slightly greater than a bolt size for fixedly fastening the door hinge to the hinge bracket. However, in a case in which the error and the like of the vehicle width direction occur at the attachment position of the hinge bracket, it is difficult to eliminate (solve) the error and the like of the vehicle width direction because of the structure of the adjusting mechanism of the door hinge.